


With You

by compo67



Series: Punzel Verse [15]
Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Anxiety, Comfort, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Ficlet, Jensen Angst, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Poetry, Protective Jared Padalecki, Sleepy Cuddles, Slice of Life, Timestamp
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-18
Updated: 2015-02-18
Packaged: 2018-03-13 14:18:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3384845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/compo67/pseuds/compo67
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is a sad feeling Jensen can't explain. It's two in the morning and he's fighting it, but maybe, he needs a little help.</p>
            </blockquote>





	With You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mcdanno28](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcdanno28/gifts).



Nothing feels right.

It’s one of those nights where he feels like he should go to bed early, just to shut up the nonsense in his head. But of course, he doesn’t. He stays up, allowing the thoughts in his head to manifest and seep into his consciousness. Like picking at scabs, he spends time on each thought, giving an audience to each one.

His skin feels too tight. The muscles in his shoulders and neck are wound up, aching, and funneling pain into his temple.

Get up. Walk around. Do _something_.

Despite knowing all of this, he can’t do any of it.

Something mid-February-gray-of-winter-aches-deep-in-his-bones-every-fucking-year grips onto him and refuses, absolutely refuses, to let go.

There is a poem rolling around in his head that he doesn’t want to hear. He’s exhausted from avoiding it, dodging every syllable, twisting away from the lines. And there is nothing to explain for this. A reason cannot be pinpointed; even the usual baggage from his past cannot be blamed nor consulted. In turn, makes it difficult to speak up, to reach over, to curl around the sleeping form next to him and ask, melancholic and silly, to please, please just get him out of his head.

Nothing is wrong. Nothing is so bad that he couldn’t figure it out in the morning. And yet everything is wrong and everything is terrible and he really should just try to sleep instead of lying here, folds of pain layering over him, keeping all the _wrong_ insulated and warm.

Their bed is familiar to him.

How many times has he collapsed onto it, either from kissing the pink, dimpled mouth of the mother of his children, or from an entire day of doing what he loves outdoors, picking, planting, pruning?

But all he wants to do is shimmy out of it—out of himself.

A persistent echo of distress reverberates through every sinew, ligament, and tissue.

Vanilla.

Focus on vanilla. On the chestnut hair fanned across two pillows. On the gentle, generous slope of hip, half exposed because tonight is warm for February, even if it feels cold inside his head. Concentrate on the rise and fall of gentle, peaceful breathing from someone capable of solving all of this if he would only just reach out and tap their shoulder and ask.

Focus on one good thing.

More than that and the effects are overwhelming.

Focus on Jared.

Match the pace of his breathing.

This will pass. It has to. It always does. And when it does, he won’t look back at whatever this is. He’ll forget about it and bask in different poems flitting through his mind and the activities of everyday life and the constant sound of parenthood.

Tomorrow, he will pick up each of his children and press kisses to their noses and wonder how he ever lived without them.

In the here and now, this is difficult.

His breath hitches without explanation or permission. Fuck.

He must make some other noise, because in a moment, Jared is turning over and half sitting up. The sheets rustle and the mattress squeaks with his movement. As he lies down once more, the scent of vanilla is stronger. Jared scoots towards him, sealing up the distance between them. He slings an arm over Jensen as they lie face to face.

Jared keeps his eyes closed. Jensen is thankful for that.

And Jared’s voice, filled with sleep, is patient and kind.

 

“My country?

You are my country.

 

My people?

You are my people.

 

Exile and death

For me are where

You are not.

 

And my life?

Tell me, my love,

What is it, if it’s not you?”

 

What are these scars? Are they recent? Are they fixtures on his heart? What are the details behind this ache, this hurt, this damage?

No explanation required.

These wounds are allowed to exist.

Jared murmurs a balm over them.

Unconditional, everlasting.

Love is never weary.

**Author's Note:**

> i was in a funk tonight. so i wrote something similar. 
> 
> this is a tough time of year for a lot of folks. i hope that if you're struggling, you reach out to someone, even if it's just for a hug. <3
> 
> "with you" by luis cernuda, translated by curtis bauer. found in the book of poems "my american kundiman" by patrick rosal. 
> 
> this is for T, who helps me out a lot.


End file.
